This is the text of my email sent to geo.correspondence@geo.gov.uk
I have not yet received an acknowledgment. Therefore I have sent a reminder and copied in Baroness Nicholson, who is taking an interest in this area. I am taking the trouble to document my response and post publicly.
Letter to Government Equalities Office.
I am a parent of a trans-identifying male. He is same sex attracted and, in my view, came to a “trans-identity” after years of homophobic bullying. (See below)
I have resisted any medicalisation and, for now, he seems content to be a male, albeit one who rejects sex stereotypes. He is learning to navigate his way in the world. He is now 19 and fully able to take any steps himself. He has not, at present, done so. He came out first (as gay) aged 11. Three years later he re-identified as “trans”. I believe this is a consequence of the homophobic insult of “girl” being now incorporated into the national discussion which tells boys, like my son, he may literally be a girl. This, to me, is the new Woke Section 28.
It was hard to watch him excluded from things because he had all female friends. However I supported 100% the right, for parents of girls, to exclude him from sleepovers. When he was included I was delighted, for him, however this was a decision for the girl’s parents. He was included only when the parents felt his presence was safe for their daughters.
My son identifies with women’s experience sufficiently to use male facilities. At school he was accommodated without compromising girls rights to dignity, privacy and safety. He as allowed to use facilities away from male toilets /changing rooms where the homophobic bullying was a heightened risk. He was accommodated sensitively without sacrifice to girls rights. I am proud that he has maintained this stance and would suggest that this is what identifying “with” women looks like.
The school did not, as many schools transgender guidance allows, “affirm” his female identity behind my back. I have always used reality based approaches to address the very real issue of “Gender Dysphoria”, secretly affirming him would have hurt my son and not helped.
I note that the referral pattern to the Gender Identity Service at the Tavistock is now 75% female. This is an inversion of the sex ratio in less than a decade. The rise in females also concerns me. The rise in boys (& girls) is likely understated because parents, like me, have no faith in the people who run these services. My son won’t appear in any statistics. Neither will the other parents who look to groups who support a “watch and wait” policy. The vast majority of these young children/teens would reconcile to biological sex and many would simply be gay males or lesbians. (Not to forget the 30% of autistic kids being referred). If we put them on puberty blockers they invariably progress to cross sex hormones.They are then going to be infertile. See research below.
I wholly support strengthening the ability for women’s organisations to enforce sex based segregated spaces. I would campaign for spaces which could help my son. He is not a woman and, whilst a lovely and empathetic male, he does not belong in female spaces.
Most women have no idea of this debate, which is happening by stealth, and represents a real attack on both women’s rights and gay rights. I don’t want to live in a world which tells “femme” gay males they are somehow #BornWrong. Neither do I wish to live in one which disregards women’s rights , as a political class, to organise and advocate on our behalf, to have female only spaces and sport.
I blog about this issue and also campaign in real life. Every single woman I have discussed this expresses disbelief that politicians could contemplate allowing men to self-identify as women. Like me they aghast that GRCs are given to fully intact males. Even more horrified when they realise a single judge can overturn a decision to reject a male for a Gender Recognition Certificate. Having read through the Hansard discussions on the GRA I believe we are well past the point of unintended consequences.
Tish (Full Name Supplied)
Sent from my iPad
